Harry S. Truman Quotes

My God, this is war against the United Nations.

But to cut off relations with an aggressor may often invite retaliation by armed action, and this would, in its turn, make necessary some form of collective self-defence by the loyal members of the League.

… the first armed aggression which the world has seen since the end of the war.

It is entirely clear that there is only one way in which great wars can be permanently prevented, and that is the establishment of an international government with a monopoly of serious armed force.

A nation has the right to defend itself, but when it comes to the broader issue of peace and security, the legitimacy rests only with the Security Council.

I don't think Russia could start a war by attacking any of the NATO member states.

Under the ominous shadow which the second World War and its attendant circumstances have cast on the world, peace has become as essential to civilized existence as the air we breathe is to life itself.

I am against preventive war because it means measures by the UN against us.

The Disarmament Conference has become the focal point of a great struggle between anarchy and world order... between those who think in terms of inevitable armed conflict and those who seek to build a universal and durable peace.

Just as the Security Council was largely irrelevant to the great struggle of the last half of the twentieth century - freedom against Communism - so too it is largely on the sidelines in our contemporary struggles against international terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

I think there has to be greater heed paid by the Security Council members to military advice.

No one wants the United Nations to suffer the fate of the League of Nations, which collapsed because it lacked real leverage. This is possible if influential countries bypass the United Nations and take military action without Security Council authorization.

First, we could have defied both of them and could have gone to war against both of these nations for this violation of international law and interference with our neutral rights.

Let us face it, the U.N. has failed. It has failed in its mission to promote world peace.

The United Nations is designed to make possible lasting freedom and independence for all its members.

This means that the search for a formula of European cooperation in connection with the League of Nations, far from weakening the authority of this latter must and can only tend to strengthen it, for it is closely connected with its aims.

The idea of the European community is never face a war again.

In the recent years there have been criticisms levelled against Japan suggesting that she should offer more military forces to the United Nations forces and thereby play a more active role in the keeping and restoration of peace in various parts of the world.

Well, I think everybody is frustrated by the finances of the U.N. and the inability to solve problems of war and peace.

European history has shown only too clearly the weakness of multilateral defensive alliances between complete sovereign nations as a means of opposing desperate and determined bids for domination of the European scene

The British can not alone act as the policemen of the world.

When states decide to use force to deal with broader threats to international peace and security, they need the unique legitimacy provided by the United Nations.

Wars are to be undertaken in order that it may be possible to live in peace without molestation. Bella suscipienda sunt ob eam causam, ut sine injuria in pace vivatur.

The main aim of any American President is to prevent World War III.

There seems no reason to doubt that such real approval as the Charter has among the people is based upon the belief that if the Charter is put into effect, wars will end... The Charter will not certainly end war. Some will ask - why not? In the first place, there is no provision in the Charter itself that contemplates ending war. It is true the Charter provides for force to bring peace, but such use of force is itself war... It is true the Charter is built to prepare for war, not to promote peace... The Charter is a war document, not a peace document. Not only does the Charter Organization not prevent future wars, but it makes it practically certain that we will have future wars, and as to such wars it takes from us the power to declare them, to choose the side on which we shall fight, to determine what forces and military equipment we shall use in the war, and to control and command our sons who do the fighting